[10] In April 1928, Ginsberg bought a 102-by-120-square-foot (9.5 by 11.1 m2) site on the northeast corner of Madison Avenue and 76th Street from the Mayer family, with plans to erect a skyscraper there.

At that time, Sylvan Bien and Joseph Prince announced that a 14-story apartment house with stores would be constructed at the southeast corner of Madison Avenue and 77th Street, on a site measuring 102 by 132 feet (31 by 40 m).

[25] The Carlyle Hotel was one of several large structures in New York City to be completed just after the onset of the Great Depression, along with London Terrace, The Majestic, Hampshire House, and 330 West 42nd Street.

[20] The new owners kept the original management, which was able to dramatically improve the property's financial situation through maintaining high occupancy and rates favorable to the hotel's costs.

[51][52] The gallery space, designed by Frederick Kiesler, occupied two stories of the hotel and included various niches, cantilevered stairs, and curving walls.

[83] The New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission proposed designating the hotel as part of the Upper East Side Historic District in 1979.

[126] A jewelry store operated by K. C. Thompson opened at the Carlyle in 2005,[127] and the hotel began lending digital cameras to its guests the next year as part of a pilot program.

[130][131] Workers restored the club's murals and added new furniture, and the interior designer Scott Salvator removed the dropped ceiling and installed a modern sound and a lighting system.

[149][150] A store and spa operated by the Valmont skincare company opened in December 2021,[159][160] and the Cafe Carlyle reopened in March 2022, having been closed for two years.

[20] The hotel "was to be a masterpiece in the modern idiom, in which shops and restaurants on the lower floors would give residents the convenience and comforts of a community skyscraper".

[168][169] Originally, the Victorian suite's dining room had a blue painted ceiling and was furnished with round glass lamps, gold-framed portraits, red window curtains, and rose-wood chairs.

[188][189] It is decorated with murals by Marcel Vertès,[189][190] which depict semi-nude women doing various activities, accompanied by motifs of musicians in whimsical outfits.

[149] Among the hotel's largest units is the presidential suite, which occupies the entire 26th floor[149][150] and has a bronze mail chute and an Art Deco–style private elevator.

[4][228] Although there had been a less formal atmosphere at the Cafe Carlyle when Short began performing there, by the 1970s it had gained a reputation as the "classiest saloon in town" where reservations were required.

[232] Other performers at the Cafe Carlyle have included Dixie Carter,[233] the Modern Jazz Quartet,[234] Woody Allen,[235] Eartha Kitt, Isaac Mizrahi, and Rita Wilson.

[4] The performers at the Bemelmans Bar over the years have included Dick Wellstood,[237] Marian McPartland,[238] Peter Mintun,[172] Loston Harris,[239] Tony Bennett,[138] Billy Joel, John Mayer, and Mariah Carey.

Women's Wear Daily wrote in 2023 that celebrities visiting the hotel during the Met Gala "create a media moment almost equal to the red carpet of the fashion fundraiser itself".

[172] U.S. presidents from Harry S. Truman to Bill Clinton have stayed at the Carlyle,[111][115] leading news media to refer to the hotel as the "White House of Manhattan".

[65] Other politicians who stayed at the Carlyle have included UN secretary-general Kurt Waldheim,[256] New York City mayor Robert F. Wagner,[257] former U.S. secretary of state Madeleine Albright[247] and former U.S. postmaster general Frank C.

[258] In the Carlyle's early years, figures such as Truman Capote, Frank Sinatra, and George Harrison frequently gathered at the hotel,[31] and the actress Ingrid Bergman was among the relative few celebrity tenants.

[24] Other celebrity guests that have frequented the hotel have included Isabella Rossellini, Elizabeth Taylor, Madonna,[140] Sophia Loren, Audrey Hepburn,[89] Annette Bening, Warren Beatty, and Robin Williams.

[261] The hotel's other co-op owners have included the television and film producer Brad Grey,[262] the art dealer Heinz Berggruen,[263] the developer Sol Goldman,[264] the journalist Gloria Steinem,[194] the financier Michael Milken, and the director Mike Nichols.

[24] Other foreign royals who have stayed at the Carlyle include Princess Grace of Monaco;[89] King Hussein of Jordan;[24] and the monarchs of Denmark, Sweden, Spain, and Greece.

[186] Another writer for the same magazine said the hotel catered to those who preferred to stay in a residential neighborhood and wanted easy access to art galleries and antique shops,[271] while a Boston Globe reporter wrote that the Carlyle "symbolizes the elan of the Upper East Side".

[92] Not all commentary was positive; a writer for Women's Wear Daily characterized the clientele as "stuffy rich",[272] and a Los Angeles Times article in 1986 described the Carlyle as being as elegant as the St. Regis New York but with a more somber undertone.

[90] When the hotel was being sold in 2000, Vogue described the Carlyle as "grand but not pretentious; wonderfully efficient without any officious coldness; associated with stately, older names but home to a young, chic clientele".

Vogue magazine described the Carlyle Restaurant as "stylishly homey" with a lively social scene and breakfast cuisine,[178] while Town & Country likened it to a private club in London.

[282] The architectural critic Christopher Gray wrote that, when the Carlyle was built, it had pierced the neighborhood's skyline like a "movie cowboy thrown through a stage-glass saloon window".

[177] The architectural critic Paul Goldberger wrote that the hotel's pinnacle "brings a sense of life" to the neighborhood's skyline, where white-brick towers predominated,[166] and he also described the Carlyle as one of several structures whose shapes "exemplify the peculiar blend of romance and energy that is Manhattan".

A writer for Women's Wear Daily characterized the lobby in 1972 as "small and elegant", saying that its ambiance "reeked" of permanent residents and short-term guests.